a biblioblog from 2009-2014

Mark Noll on scriptura sola: blessing or curse?

This morning I watched the above lecture titled, “Scriptura Sola After Nearly 500 Years: A Protestant Blessing or a Protestant Curse?” It is delivered by Mark Noll, one of the foremost historians of religion, most specifically Protestantism in its American context. I think Noll does an even handed job of presenting the positives and negatives associated with the outworking of scriptura sola and he mentions that in a year he will return to Gordon College (where this lecture is given) to deliver another one on the same subject with more research involved.

I welcome you to watch the lecture and share your thoughts.

Personally, I struggle with this doctrine. I’ve heard the apologetics for its defense, and I know people clarify that it is “sola” not “solo” (a play on words used to emphasize finality of authority, not isolation as the only authority), but it sure causes me a lot of cognitive disconnect.

First, there is the internal problem that if Scripture is the final word how do we know what constitutes an authoritative canon of Scripture since Scripture itself does not provide a list? We may appeal to the work of the Spirit in the formation of the canon, but it seems that the Spirit worked through the church, and even then the church doesn’t always share exactly the same canon (compare Protestants to Catholics to Orthodoxy to the Coptic church…).

Second, there are some doctrines like the Trinity where Scripture provides the “seed,” but the “oak” itself–while derived from that seed–is not one and the same as the seed. In other words, the Trinity is formed on the basis of Scripture but it is a tradition that evolved from Scripture, plus the hermeneutics of the church over hundreds of years, plus a Pneumatology that guides one to affirm that the church correctly interprets Scripture where it matters, plus authoritative interpreters who were used to come together to make decisions on orthodoxy (e.g., bishops at councils, which is far from the democracy of evangelicalism with which I am acquainted), and so forth.

Third, Scripture (in my view) is a difficult source for systematic theology because often it includes contradictory positions on matters and tensions in worldview. Jesus says to turn the other cheek. The Book of Joshua include a divinely mandated genocide. The Book of Proverbs tells the readers that various truisms will lead to the “good life.” The Books of Ecclesiastes and Job say that there may not be any such thing as the “good life,” or that God may allow “bad things to happen to good people,” yet the reader must remain faithful to God nevertheless. In the Synoptic Gospels Jesus says and does things on behalf of God, sometimes speaking in ways that could be interpreted to mean he sees himself as sharing the divine nature, but nothing comes close to Jesus’ straightforward language about his oneness with the Father as the Gospel of John.

All things considered, though I am no church historian, it seems the truth of the matter is that Arius had as many proof-texts as the Council of Nicaea, Pelagius could exegete like Augustine, and the line between “orthodoxy” and “heresy” is as wide as the words in a section of Scripture that both groups use against each other.

Yet I don’t want to lead readers to believe that I find other approaches more helpful than that of evangelicalism’s at this juncture in my intellectual journey. I am skeptical of some of the cause-and-effect of tradition upon the Roman Catholic and Orthodox communities. I’m not quite sold on the flotsam and jetsam approach to Christianity I see exemplified by so-called “Progressive” or “Liberal” groups either. I don’t know that a hierarchy solves my problems when they tell me Mary the mother of Jesus was sinless or that it is evil to use contraception. Neither do I see a point in being a Christian when I am told Jesus is a good model to emulate bringing the “kingdom of God” to this world, but there is no room for a resurrection from the dead, a second coming of Christ, or any of those foolish mythologies.

22 thoughts on “Mark Noll on scriptura sola: blessing or curse?”

I read his Very Short Introduction to Protestantism and his main theme seemed to be that the more you put scripture into the hands of the average person the more denominations you end up with. He was not against scripture being read by people but he was clearly concerned with the results. Which it seems he is repeating here. I do have to say I have many of the same concerns but also can’t see an alternative.

I’m in the same boat and have a lot to think through. I watched this when you posted it today and thought it was very good and I am looking forward to hearing him next year. I found his reasons to be evangelical in his question “compared to what?” to be pragmatic; it was just some “benefits” of not being catholic, which are only valued within the evangelical community. I may need to listen to him again, though. Also, I think we have to say protestants and evangelicals have had an influence on Catholicism and challenged RC’s in a positive way. He mentioned Christian Smith, who has converted to Catholicism; he has written a lot recently in this area “The Bible Made Impossible” and “How to Go from Being a Good Evangelical to a Committed Catholic in 95 Difficult Steps”. Like never before it is becoming very common for evangelicals to become E.O. or R.C. I think the disunity of protestants is very hard to accept when we read the prayer of Jesus for us to be one and Paul’s stress for the church to be united.

Me thinks that everyone who makes much of the Scriptures and all of the left-brained theology theology or interpretations of the same Scripture should seriously take into account something Paul said namely that the left-brained word always kills the Living Divine Spirit.
The Protestant tradition is of course very much a tradition based on the Spirit-killing left-brained word.
One should also take into account the fact that no Illuminated Saints have appeared within the Western Christian tradition since the cultural revolution that began with the European Renaissance. Such is of course essentially impossible within the left-brained Spirit-killingl Protestant tradition

I can’t think of an alternative either. Honestly, Protestantism and evangelicalism by their very nature are a petri dish for doctrinal relativism. I think this is why some evangelicals are freaking out about the demise of inerrancy among evangelicals because inerrancy was our Pope. Sure, there remained diverse views of this or that, but at least inerrancy could whittle down the options and expose the “liberals.”

Ben

I think I have been wrestling with this question of authority for a while now. When I left Pentecostalism I sought a free place to think. I was attracted to the emerging church. But over the years (while having little interest in being mindless subjected to a hierarchy who demands allegiance) I have become disoriented by all the views of this and that and the other. It is paralyzing. I think scripture is far too diverse and nuanced to provide a singular, coherent worldview. Ideas like the “plain reading of scripture” seem ignorantly optimistic in my opinion. So my dismay with biblicism (like C. Smith’s book, and other critiques by evangelicals like Enns, Kirk, Sparks, et al.) has left me wondering if there remains a way to allow the Bible to maintain its place as the “final” authority while being realistic that tradition needs to have a more prominent place or there needs to be comfort in the sloppiness, the disconnect, and the subjectivity that is evangelical Christianity.

I think that the 1st century followers had this option but without rebuilding what they had by using quotes of the early writers and testing them against what has been delivered to us we dont have that option. Mid to late 2nd century Pagananity (truth mixed with fables) and the hatred for anything jewish was over taking the 1st centuy belief . I provided an example of just how the truth was being changed as late as the beginning of 4th century in another thread here. http://nearemmaus.com/2012/09/20/if-jesus-was-married-does-it-matter/#comments in which Eusebius of Caesarea doesnt have a clue that Yahshua was raised upon sunday. In this letter it shows “mia ton Sabbaton” was confusing to Eusebius because the jewish meaning of it refering to a week in a count not a day was getting very vague. But this shows that Eusebius rejects a sunday resurrection at the time of this letter but by 325 AD when sunday was declared the day he had changed his mind probably under duress and the fear of being excommunicated by the Constantine who was a sun god worshiper convert. .
If we had the autographs i believe there would be no doctrine that couldnt be proved by them .

One alternative to the authority of Scripture is the authority of the New Testament. For the fulfillment of the O.T. in Jesus meant a whole new kingdom (from the kingdom of Israel to Jesus’ kingdom of God), where there was one authority: Jesus, the Christ (king). I think the N.T. presents a basically unified portrait of Jesus and his new kingdom of disciples–and how his kingdom differs from the kingdom of Israel and its law of Moses. For disciples of Jesus, the final authority is “Jesus is Lord;” the N.T., written and influenced by Jesus’ original apostles, shows us the truth of that Jesus.

I don’t know if Noll mentions this, but Hooker is an interesting, and often neglected, figure in regards to the question of how to understand and explain the authority of the Bible. A quick ATLA search will bring up some articles on Hooker in this regard.

Guess what sola means in Latin? Just as it means in sola fide. 🙂 So I’m not a fan of this distinguishing between sola and solo.

In my studies around a doctrine of Scripture, I’ve come to appreciate more and more a full-orbed perspective on God’s revelation – the Spirit’s activity/speaking, the Scripture, the historic church, the current body of Christ, creation, etc. I still, in my evangelical roots, love Scripture and turn to it more than the others, in a sense. But I don’t believe sola scriptura is actually Scripturally nor reasonably defended. You’ve noted some good points and there are others. And it normally ties into other usual evangelical doctrines like inerrancy. I am no Roman Catholic or Eastern Orthodox person. But, while Scripture is a very important tool, I cannot at this point fully embrace the sola aspect. I have more used prima scriptura these days, but I still want to think through things.

I’m not a fan of the distinction either. I was trying to note that some people do a play on the words (though, yes, there is no real difference) in order to better explain their views. Scriptura prima is better and like you I think a paradigm wherein the active work of the Spirit, the guiding narrative of Scripture, and the influential testimony of the church past and present inform us rather than pretending that we objectively read the final and authoritative text.

Brian
Do you believe that Moses,the Prophets, Yahshua, the Apostles and those of the 1st century church were lacking knowledge about the truth? If not then what compels you to claim that everything we need to know was not included in the OT and NT writings as they were originally wrote?

The reformation brought about the doctrine of the sufficiency of Scripture. I would be aware that 2 Tim 3:15 states, and how from infancy you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. But I’m not sure this addresses the reality of ‘everything we need to know’, as you state in your comment above. Some like to caveat this and say Scripture is the final authority on all issues. And I understand that. But the reality is that Scripture does not give us ‘everything we need to know’ on all topics.

I don’t turn to Scripture to give me all the details on science or counselling or mathematics. I know that sounds obvious (well, maybe not for counselling, though I would still argue Scripture is not inherently a counselling textbook), but I think we actually find freedom to enjoy God’s good creation(s) in the world as it has been given when we realise we can actually gain a lot outside the Scripture. I don’t make all things of equal authority. But I also guard against trying to work so evangelically hard to make the Scripture more than it is. The Bible doesn’t lay out ‘biblical sex’ or ‘biblical counselling’ or state it’s the great authority on the intricacies of the sciences or the arts. Of course we are informed on sex, counselling, science, the arts, etc, in Scripture. But it is not given to be the absolute authority on these things, at least as I can tell. We can start there (hence why I argue for prima scriptura rather than sola scriptura). But they are not the say all-end all on these topics, are they?

I hope that explains a bit more, at least from my own approach. Brian can sure add more to it.

Well my belief is if it was a doctrine necessary for salvation then It should be found in the OT and NT. The only problem is finding out what has been corrupted the 2nd ,3rd and 4th centuries. There was no concept of the trinity in the 1st century and Yahshua was 110% human, then by mid to late 2nd Yahshua was a created by and unequal to the Creator. By the 3rd he was becoming prexistant and equal , by the 4th he was 1 in 3 equal gods. If it wasnt there in the 1st then it was probaby manmade to either exalt the church leader or to bring in more pagans to increase the riches of the church.. I dont claim the scripture only doctrine unless we could know for sure what was in the autographs so proving and reproving using every resource available till I can rebuild exactly what was believed by the 1st century church.
I also reject the virgin birth because in the first mentions by the early church Matthew and what we call Luke were without the birth account and no other writer of the NT had a clue about it. I also reject that the Law given to israel has ended and see it as necessary if you want to take part in the Sabbath rest of YHWH which is the fulfillment of the promise given to Abraham,Isaac and Jacob that they would possess all the land shown but understand Grace to come at the Great White judgement where all mankind from Adam to present will be shown the truth about the redemption of mankind by the Lamb. The only ones that loose salvation will be those that deny the truth and the Lamb because of their own conceit and the failure to admit they are not a god themselves

Robert, in principle I agree with your representation of how ‘doctrine’ has been built up. This means in principle, I agree some of the doctrine we (collectively) hold may be false:
-For example I deny the concept of ‘church’ from the word ‘ekklesia’, instead seeing ekklesia as an OT description of those (previously) called brought forward into the Greek (an idiom already seen).
-Likewise, I see the injection of the concept ‘Gentiles (capitalized even) as a product of the anti-Israelization efforts of Anti-Semitic church fathers and dangerously close to replacement theology.

So yes, orthodoxy has its warts, but the question that should concern us is does that make all orthodoxy (by that I mean ecclesiastical tradition, including the trinity) wrong? The orthodox view Yahshua IS God is not without warrant, scripturally. Similarly, the doctrine of the trinity as a named doctrine may not be in both covenants BUT asking the questions separately “Is the Father treated scripturally as God?; Is Yahshua the Messiah, treated scripturally as God (did he claim to be)? Is the Spirit commonly denoted the Holy spirit, treated scripturally as God?” all lead to affirmative answers which cumulatively necessitate a doctrine close to the that of the Trinity.

Even if you personally reject portions of that (say because you’re not convinced), you cannot not say the doctrine of the Trinity is unreasonable (unsound). (Logically, you must recognize that if the premises are true the conclusion must be valid even if you personally don’t hold the premises as true. What ever the truth value of the premises – the logic can still be sound) Which means to prove the conclusion false, don’t attack the logic, attack the premises.

Andrew
I dont deny Unity of Yah, Havah and the office of the Word , I just dont find any evidence of equality. Yah the Elyon created The Wisdom before all other creation and the office of the Word which many have held is 3rd in rank. Now are all these in unity ? Absolutely . Is the office of the Word older than the one that holds it currently and for now on? Absolutely. Has the one in that office been given power and authority from the Elohim? Absolutely.
Is there any scriptures that deny this? Absolutely Not
Is the belief or disbelief in the doctrine of the trinity a salvation issue?Absolutely Not

Robert, I’m not a theologian, but I believe there is some sense it which three persons/One God doesn’t necessitate ‘equality’. I suppose that term needs to be agreed upon.

Yahshua, subordinated himself to ‘God the father’. He prayed to Him, he preceded forward from him. Similarly, Yahshua had to first depart for the ‘helper’ to come. In this sense ‘the helper’ was subordinate to and proceeded from Yahshua, who was subordinate to and proceeded from the Father.

When Jesus prayed “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done.” [Luke 22:42] He was in some sense illustrating the order of precedence. That does not mean though, he was not fully divine, or of the same substance. This apparent subordination does not imply inequality in an ontological sense, rather it implies differentiation.

You use such foreign terminology, I can’t tell if there is a controversy between us, or not.

Andrew
A concept can be whatever one or a group conceives it to be. As for the orthodox concept all 3 are uncreated and equal. Yahweh is the father, Yahshua is the son and the Holy Spirit an it with all 3 making one God which i find absolutely no support for.
My belief is there is only one Most High(Elyon) El who is uncreated, there is one Wisdom(Gospel’s Holy Spirit) who is the 1st created and was cocreator of all other creation and one office of the Word(Son) which was created to communicate(mediate) with Mankind. I believe that lucifer was the first holder of that office but pride caused him to exalt himself above the creator, Adam was created to replace lucifer but was deceived by lucifer. Since then the Elohim has used humans in a limited capacity to fill this office and at times maybe tribal gods such as Michael and Gabriel when humans failed . Abraham and his offspring was chosen as the line in which one would come who would execute this office with complete obedience. This person would restore this office to its original purpose as a mediator for all mankind at judgement as promised to Abraham in the blessing of all nations
To bring this person into existance by keeping the bloodline of Havah(Eve) free of the blood of satan’s bloodline(Cain) promises were made to Abraham,his Offspring and those that joined themselves by taking hold of the words of this covenant in which Yahshua was the last King in the Line of Judah to be anointed by the anointer to be King of Israel and because of all the commandments to stay separated from the other nations the Satan’ rule over the gentiles was crushed
My Yahshua had 2 literal fathers .Joseph his father by blood as the offspring of David and Yah his father by spirit as the first born of the dead and an adopted son of the Elohim at his baptism.

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